Malacca

Malacca as one of the beautiful and historical places we visited in Malaysia is still in my list of places to visit again. Yes, I want to visit Malacca Malaysia again and visit the other places which we couldn’t see in our 3 days trip.(2 nights) On our first day we spent time around the Malacca Dutch square and Christ Church. Those red buildings fascinated us with historical backgrounds.

On the 2nd day we started our journey walking along the Melaka River. The river itself is not so beautiful scene for me; however it has some unique appearance with the buildings along the river which are mostly built in many years ago.

Melaka River

Sungai Malacca or Melaka River is also known as the ‘Venice of the East’. Those Europeans who travelled along this Melaka River started to call it as the ‘Venice of the East’ and it has historical importance in trading and other such activities.

Here are some of our findings along the Malacca riverside walk.Add these things to your Malacca attractions list when you prepare your travel plan to Meleka Malaysia.Because these are some of the must see Malacca attractions if you visit one day!

Melaka River Cruise

Melaka River Cruise

Cruise over Melaka River is one of the popular activities for many tourists; however we didn’t take river cruise. Instead we loved walking along the riverside. But, when we were walking along the Melaka River, we could see people who enjoyed river cruise.

Although we missed Melaka River Cruise on our previous trip to Malacca,I am eagerly waiting to try this experience in our next holiday to Malacca.

In Melaka River Cruise, you will travel by small boats along the Melaka River. This River Cruise will be about 45 minutes which covers the most of villages, churches and historic buildings along the Melaka River.

Beautiful Historical Buildings

You can watch beautiful architecture of buildings which were dated back to colonial era of Melaka. Most of These buildings are now converted to hotels or restaurants. However, these buildings added beautiful historical view to Malacca.

Fort of Malacca

Fort of Malacca

Fort of Malacca is at one end of the Malacca River and it faces the Dutch Square in another view. This Fort is one of the fascinating sites which we found in Malacca which was a great huge fort in Portuguese days.

At the Fort of Malacca

Malacca Sultanate Watermill

Malacca Sultanate Watermill

Located in the banks of the Melaka River, this Malacca Sultanate Watermill is considered as the largest watermill in Malaysia. Nowadays, it is not a functioning watermill. Instead this Melaka Watermill is a replica which reminds its proud history.

People watching

Wedding Couple at Malacca

Well, this may not sound interesting for some of you 🙂 . But, we could actually watch and see the local life there among the many tourists. We couldn’t stay away from watching the wedding couples who had photo sessions in the historical places of Malacca.It seems Malacca is popular among locals as a photography location.

Maritime Museum of Malacca

Maritime Museum of Malacca

The Maritime Museum of Malacca is another attraction we found in Malacca. However, this is at the end of our walk along the river.

This Maritime Museum is a huge replica of the ‘Flora de La Mar’ which is a Portuguese ship. This Portuguese ship sank off the coast of Malacca while they were heading to Portugese together with items which they plundered from Melaka. This Maritime Museum is also known as Muzium Samudera in Malay language.

You need to buy tickets to enter into the museum.

Dutch windmill at Melaka Town Square

Dutch windmill at Melaka Town Square

The Dutch windmill of Melaka can be a part of the attractions in Dutch square. But, we ended our riverside walk when we reached this windmill location. On one side of the street, there are plenty of street food stalls which you can try local delicacies. On the other side, it is red square or Dutch square.

We stopped near the Dutch Windmill and nowadays it looks like a garden area.

After a walk along the Melaka River, we visited the buildings and attractions of red square again. It was a fascinating tour to Malacca. I still have more memories to share from Malacca although it was a 3 day 2 nights trip.

Malacca or Melaka which is a UNESCO heritage site full of attractions was in my destination list for a long time. Rich cultural diversity, proud historical buildings & footprints of colonial influence and of course the delicious food are the reasons to admire this historical state of Malaysia. Still this fascinating city is with colonial structures and remaining British, Dutch and Portuguese influence. If you were given few days to visit Malacca, you will first get lost because there are so many things to see in Malacca and admire. But, if you visit Malacca and to complete your trip in Malacca, you should first visit the UNESCO heritage site and see the attractions.

No, we were not there for 24 hours. Instead we spent 2 nights there and in this post I want to highlight the must see attractions in Malacca to make your holiday memorable even you left with 24 hours.

Christ Church – Melaka

We started our journey from Christ Church Melaka which was built by Dutch. This beautiful red church is one of the landmarks in Malacca which anyone should see.

Water Fountain – Melaka

Our next visit was to the attractions in Dutch Square which is just opposite the Christ Church. There is a beautiful water fountain at the centre of the area and there are beautiful red buildings around the Dutch square. This area is the best place to hire rickshaws which are decorated with colourful flowers.

In our visit to Melaka we saw lot of wedding couples who were taking photos with different poses. Most of them were wearing the traditional sultanate dresses.

A wedding couple

Oliver the Bulldozer is one of the major attractions which were used before the 2nd world war. The buildings and structures are red painted and they showed the proud history of this Malaysia state.

Oliver – The Bulldozer

We didn’t forget to read and learn bit of history on our first day in Malacca.

Things to do in Malacca, Dutch Square

Here are the main attractions in this small corner of the UNESCO Heritage site.

Including Christ Church Melaka, there are beautiful and historical buildings which you can see and explore in Malacca. A rickshaw tour will make your visit memorable and you can easily hire one parked near the red square .

The bulldozer, clock tower and other buildings are the major attractions. Don’t forget to watch locals and their activities. Different cultural activities will make your visit exciting. We were glad to see wedded couples and their beautiful costumes.

Delicious food

Street food is another thing which you must not miss. Be sure to try different food during your stay because Malacca is a popular destination for Nonya food and other delicacies.

Where to stay in Malacca

There are lots of hotels in Malacca. So finding accommodation is not difficult. We stayed at Emperor Hotel ,Malacca ,which is in walking distance to major attractions.

How to reach Malacca from Singapore

If you don’t drive, then it is easy to travel by bus. There are buses which go to Malacca central and other major hotels from Singapore. You can easily book buses online to Malacca and then rest assured. In our trip to Malacca, we booked bus tickets from Busonlineticket and we didn’t face any problem. There are many buses departing from Singapore to Melaka and we booked our bus which is of Delima Express.

We could select our pick up point as we wished and reached there for the scheduled time. From Malacca central, we hired a taxi to the hotel. It was a hassle free tour.

Malacca Sultanate Palace is one of the best places we visited in our Melaka Malaysia tour.Malacca is a must visit attraction in Malaysia and in our previous visit we found that 2 days are not enough to see all the attractions,to try food and to do some shopping. However we managed to visit the historical places around the Malacca UNESCO heritage site. Though these photos are from our trip in 2012,I thought of sharing those as still the story behind is helpful for anyone who wants to visit Malacca.

Malacca Sultanate Palace-Malaysia

Our day 2 started from walk along the Melaka River and then we reached the Famosa Fort.After spending some time in Famosa Fort, we saw this wooden building. The building was really attractive and thought it was another historical attraction of Melaka. It was the Melaka Sultanate Palace Museum.

At first, I thought it was the actual palace where the sultans lived. But it is not true. it’s a replica of the Sultanate Palace .But,I wanted to say that it is done brilliantly!

The entire replica/Sultanate palace was made of wood. Windows were with colourful glasses making the palace more attractive.

As per the information board in front of the palace, this replica is built based entirely on original 15th century palace of sultanate.

We have to climb stairs to enter into this palace. At the front entrance you’ll find two warriors standing to represent how this palace was during the time it was the actual palace of sultanate.

Malacca Sultanate Palace-Malaysia

I didn’t forget to take a photo of me with one of the guards at the entrance. Actually the entrance was with a beautiful doorway. We spent some time looking around those artistic details.

Inside the museum is like a living and active palace! Visitors are able to see the Palace atmosphere inside the halls. We could experience a day of the Malay Sultans during the Malay Sultanate era in Malacca.

Inside was a replica of the main hall. We could see life size figurines representing the reign of Sultan Mansur Shah. They look so strange and I actually had a feeling that I was in front of the sultanate. Actually, a little bit scary as I am in front of the sultanate! Yes, those look like actual! 🙂

Below is a capture of the replica about famous fighting between Hang Tuah and Hang Jebat.

There was another section that displays traditional costumes for each state in Malaysia.

Other than that, We could see figurines of traders from different countries who visited Malaysia too during that time.

When we entered into this palace it was almost noon. We were bit tired by walking under the hot sun to see other attractions. But, this palace was very cool and relaxing. We walked around and had a good time by reading details of each displays.

Below are some captures from the Royal Chamber.

Inside the palace we could see Exhibits including brassware and other porcelain stuffs used at that time.

Below is another replica of a palace which we could find inside the museum.

The second floor houses the antique jewelries and ornaments use by the Malay women during that era. I found those are interesting and bit similar to some of those ancient jewelries of Sri Lanka. Specially some of those hair pins.

We could also find mannequin of Malay couples dressed with their costumes and jewelries.

We had a great time visiting this place. It was a remarkable tour in our life and still we need to visit Malacca again to see some other historical places we missed during this tour.

While planning another trip to Malaysia during this weekend, I just thought of sharing some thoughts and review on The Emperor Hotel Malacca where we stayed 2 nights in November 2012.Though it is sometimes ago, I still have good memories with this place including food we had there in Malacca.

At that time, I didn’t capture much photos of this hotel, however it was a pleasant stay and we enjoyed the facilities without complains. It was worth for the money we paid. The most important thing for us was that this hotel is situated in a place where we could walk to the attractions of Melaka including the UNESCO world heritage site. Our package included breakfast, other than that we received a free voucher at that time for dine at their restaurant.

Below are some captures from the breakfast buffet which we enjoyed.

This hotel is nestled in the heart of Melaka and most of the attractions are in a walking distance.

Below are some of the captures of room interior though I don’t have good interior pictures from the hotel.

This framed picture was really matching with the empty wall

The staff was very friendly,polite and helpful.We don’t have any complains regarding the customer service. Room was very spacious and had a relaxed feeling when we first entered there. Other than that,we could access free Wi-Fi in lobby area.

If you don’t want to dine in the hotel restaurant, there are lot of places around the place to try lot of different signature food of Malacca.

As always, we arranged this trip in last minute. So, we didn’t have much time to check reviews of what others say about hotels in Malacca. Even,most of the hotels near the Malacca heritage sites were fully booked as that was a long weekend in Singapore. Therefore, we booked this hotel for one day thinking of finding another place if we are not satisfied. However, we finally extended to another day and stayed there 2 nights while exploring the attractions of Melaka city including some shopping.

Melaka/Malacca is a historical site in Malaysia & it is one of UNESCO’s World Heritage since 2008.
Here are some captures of our last year visit to Melaka.It is worth visiting this historical site.We had a great holiday there.